It was from the customs of the Quraysh, that the Arab would take them and live with them outside of Makkah until they grow up. The Arab would do this as a form of Rizq – provision to earn a wage, however they would not accept payment for breastfeeding, they considered this rude. So they would take the children without agreeing on or determining a wage, but it was customary for them to be paid later as a form of gratitude and honour. The breastfeeding women of Bani Sa’ad arrived. Among them was Halima Asa’diya and her husband Al-Harith. They were also looking for an infant to take. They were in a very poor state, and Halima had an infant boy whom she was breastfeeding already. She says that ‘Due to our state of poverty I didn’t even have enough milk for my child’ but she was in search of a child out of anticipation for the wage to be paid later on. She came to Makkah riding on a very weak female donkey, which as a result of its weakness it would delay the group of riders. The women would say to her, ‘O Halima, hurry it up, you have delayed us’ and she would try to hurry up the donkey but it would be unable to walk any faster. They finally got to Makkah, and started searching for the infants. Amina would offer them her child (peace be upon him), but once they would realize that he is an orphan they would refuse him. All of the breastfeeding woman refused him. Halima searched and searched for an infant but did not find one, so she left. While her and her husband were sitting outside Makkah, her husband Al-Harith said, ‘We are going back without an infant whereas all your friends are returning with an infant, how about we return and take the orphan child lest that we take from his blessings.’ So they agreed. Halima went and took Muhammed(peace be upon him) and the blessing began.

The first blessing was that the state of the donkey changed. On the way back this donkey was now ahead of the rest and Halima was trying to hold it back. The other women asked her, ‘O Halima, is this the same donkey that you came on?’ She replied ‘Yes’ and they were bewildered. Also, her breastmilk became ample, wherein she would feed her infant and then feed Muhammed (peace be upon him) until they were both full. They returned to their home in Banu Sa’ad. They had a widowed camel which they had lost all hope in, but subhan’Allah the camel began to increase in weight, and her mammary glands began to get full with milk. They were astonished, how? Also the sheep that they owned began increasing in weight and number very quickly, whereas everyone else’s sheep where not putting on weight. So the people would say to the shepards, ‘Take the sheep to graze where Halima’s sheep graze’. They would reply, ‘By Allah our sheep graze with them, but without the same benefit’. This is from the blessing of the Prophet(peace be upon him).

Life went on normally, and the Prophet was now two years old. Halima says about him, that he grew quickly in a way that most kids don’t grow. She says when he was a child of two years, he looked as if he was a child of six years old. Furthermore, he would speak fus’ha Arabic when he was only two years old. This is from the honor of Allah to the Prophet Muhammed (peace be upon him). After two years, the custom is that the kids are returned to Makkah and there parents decide to either keep their children or to return them to the desert environment for a little while longer. Halima kept persisting on returning Muhammed (peace be upon him) with her, until she finally convinced his mother Amina. So the Prophet returned with Halima.

Halima says that after a few months an incident took place. The Prophet peace be upon him had brothers and sisters from Halima. One day his brother (who used to breastfeed with him) ran to his parents Halima and Al-Harith frightened. He said ‘My Qurayshi brother is unconcious’, They said, ‘what is wrong with him?’ He replied, ‘Two men came to him wearing white clothes and hit him’. So Halima and Al-Harith became really concerned and they ran to the Prophet (peace be upon him). They found him, his face having changed and in a state of great fear. They said, ‘What happened to you?’ He said, ‘Two men came to me wearing white clothes. They then hit me causing me to fall to the ground, they then opened up my chest and removed my heart, and washed it in a vessel of gold with the water of zamzam, and they removed from it a black clot and threw it away. They then said, this is the chance of shaytan with you, and they filled my heart with wisdom’. They then returned his heart to its place and closed up his chest and stitched it up. This hadith is sahih. The Prophet (peace be upon him) uncovered his shirt and the marks of the stitching were still present. Here Halima got really scared, so she said to her husband ‘Maybe they are from the Jinn, let us return the child to his mother’. So they returned Muhammed to his mother Amina. She said ‘What happened, you were so keen to keep him with you?’ They said, ‘We were afraid if something happens to him, we thought it would be better that we return him while he is fine’. She said, ‘No by Allah, something happened’. She kept at them until they told her about the incident. She said, ‘Were you afraid for him from the Jinn?’ They said ‘Yes’. She said, “No by Allah, I had seen when giving birth to him a man calling me in a dream and requesting me to say, ‘u’iithuhu bilahil-wahid min shari kuli hasid’ which means ‘I seek for him, refuge in Allah the One from the evil of every envier’ by Allah evil will not touch him”. Amina then left them after giving them ikraam.

When the Prophet (peace be upon him)was six years old, Amina passed away, so he became an orphan of the mother and father. His uncle now took him up and a new stage of the Prophets (peace be upon him) life then began.

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